


writing exercises and other nonsense

by blueberrynewt



Category: Original Work
Genre: Drabble Collection, Gen, Inspired by Music, Other, Writing Exercise
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 21:31:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20316325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueberrynewt/pseuds/blueberrynewt
Summary: just a place for me to dump whatever random writing exercises and such that I like well enough to want people to read them. I have no idea what might end up here and will update tags as I go.





	writing exercises and other nonsense

**Author's Note:**

> this is a strange, melancholy little thing without specific characters. just sort of the idea of characters. you can make them whatever you want to imagine.
> 
> my friend and I were talking about writing inspired by music, and came up with the idea of doing writing exercises based around albums. just listen to the album in order (each song on repeat for as long as you need) and make a story out of it. this one is from Firecracker by the Wailin' Jennys. it also came together in under 2 hours so like, no promises wrt quality.

i.

How long has it been, really?

Five years? Five decades? Five lifetimes?

I thought it would be forever. So did you.

This dusty road under my feet, taking me away from you — God knows where it leads. Wildflowers line both sides, bright against dry grass, and the sun is hot in a sky as bright and clear as the first couple of years we knew each other. It’s a beautiful picture, really. Makes me feel like I could go on this way, go on walking through an endless afternoon, everything I dreamed of dwindling into the hazy distance behind me. Not looking back.

You must know I never meant for it to end like this. You know me well enough to realize that this took me by surprise just as much as it did you. We were both standing on the rug when it got yanked out from under us.

Which is not to say that it isn't my fault. It is, of course. I'm not so callous that I could ruin the best thing I ever had and then refuse to take responsibility for it.

You know I'm sorry.

Well, what the hell? I did ruin it, one way or the other, and now there's no clear path ahead of me, no obvious destination. I've never felt this way before. It's sort of...liberating. Terrible, but free. I just have to figure out each day as it comes, until I die. I wonder when that'll be.

I wonder if I'll ever see her again.

You'd be within your rights to hate me for thinking that, but I guess that doesn’t matter anymore. I miss you both.

  


ii.

You ever lie awake at night, listening to the train whistles, wondering where they're going?

I'm nowhere near any train tracks now, but that's about how I feel. Wistful, or something.

I keep thinking about death. Figure that's where I'll next see you, along with everyone else. I wonder what my mom will say when she sees me.

I think I'm on my way. I'm almost looking forward to it. Returning to the earth, you know? Reintegrating.

Besides. It's not like I've had a lot to live for these past years.

I know, I know. My fault.

  


iii.

Sometimes I remember all too well what it was like to be in love with you.

I remember leaning on your shoulder after some of the worst days of my life, agonizing about the things I'd done and the things that had been done to me, unable to tear myself out of the memories. Unable to stand on my own.

I remember your hands on my back, your voice in my ear. Holding me up, keeping me whole — or as close to whole as I think I've ever been.

I know I asked too much of you. Again, my fault.

I remember how it was at the beginning, how we hurried to open ourselves up to each other, how we floundered when we had to actually learn how to care for each other. It’s never easy, but we were eager, even desperate, to figure it out. To be the perfect couple, always there for each other.

You were so good at it. Turns out I wasn't.

  


iv.

These are the things I should have said, but never learned how to.

I should have said, I see you.

I should have said, _ tell me about despair, yours._

I should have said, you are allowed to feel these things, even when they hurt.

You are allowed to say what you mean, to take what you need. You are allowed to not always be giving too much.

I should have said, here. I have taken so much comfort from you. Let me return the favor.

Instead, having taken what I needed from you, I pushed you away. Worse — I let you go.

I should have said, I don't know what you know, but I would like to learn. Please tell me.

  


v.

Maybe the problem was that we chased too fast.

We met in the morning, do you remember? We met and we talked and we poured ourselves into each other, and orbited each other, and pursued each other in circles, looking for our dreams in one another’s faces.

Hunter and prey both. We revelled in it.

And you were there, then gone, there and gone again, with the wind. Intoxicating. I used to count down the days until you'd pass through again. Being with you, I could remember that there was more to the world than my own history, surrounding me day after day. You made the pieces of me settle into place, like they meant something all together, like I was a real person.

When you stopped holding on to me, I just drifted away.

  


vi.

Sometimes it hurts so much, you know? Sometimes I just want to fall back into your arms and let you lift away all the wrongs I've done, all the hurt I've endured, the way you used to.

I've been broken so many times.

It's winter now, and in the morning the yellow grass is caked in frost that crunches where I step. I sit here and I look at myself and I look at the others, all these others in the forgotten corners of the world, and it makes me want to pray.

It makes me want to say, please, Lord, stop punishing us. So much evil has been done. Let us come home to You at last.

I haven't prayed since I was fourteen.

  


vii.

I've always had nightmares about the end of the world. They're always the same, pretty much. I can't shake the feeling that they're basically true.

I thought you and I could make it worth it. You know, paradise before the fall. A life worth living even if it ended in the Apocalypse.

But it didn't. It didn’t end in fire and flood, in nuclear winter or a sky full of ash. It ended in distance, in silence, in lies. It ended in a shake of the head and the sound of a closing door.

I would hold onto you still, if I thought I could. Isn't that shameful? I think the end of the world is closer now.

  


viii.

I remember you with tears in your eyes, whispering, when did I lose you?

I couldn't explain it then, maybe I couldn't now if you were standing in front of me looking like that. Never been good with talking.

But I can tell you here, in my heart, where you'll never hear it. I can tell you that you lost me the first time I failed to ask, how was your day? The first time I failed to notice the circles under your eyes, or the first time I didn’t question the drumming of your fingers against my collarbone.

I never took you for granted, not really. But I didn't say what I knew. I would look around and smile and think, we made it. And I would look at you and assume you were thinking the same thing.

I've worn those memories into threadbare scraps by now. I was so sure that we were happy. So certain that we had gotten where we were going that I took my eyes off the road, and wandered off in the wrong direction. Away from you.

God, I'm so cold.

  


ix.

This time I really am dying.

It's been so long. I still think about you sometimes. I figured some things out, made some sort of a life for myself. Even some friends.

Even so, I'm looking forward to this last journey. Home is a tricky concept, and I'm not sure if what I have now would qualify, but death has always sounded like home to me.

Rest, at least. I could use a good long rest.

  


x.

Back in this town again. Just like old times. Five weeks since we fell apart and I'm back here, trying to pretend no time has passed. As if I could pretend I never knew you.

I'm not that good a liar, as you know too well.

Everything here is the same as it ever was, except that everyone's older than last time. Everyone still struggling to survive, fighting that losing battle day after day. The crows still sit at the tops of the trees or flock to the fields, shouting about death. I always liked listening to them.

I'm going to fix things, I think. I think I can. Not for myself, of course, but for everyone else in this town. Frodo and the Shire, you know? I can fix things, but I can't stick around to see the sunshine. I'm not much of a sunshine person, really. Pull this town out of the ditch, then it’s off to the Grey Havens with me.

I hope they'll have some peace when I'm gone.

  


xi.

I was so scared of it, you remember.

Not the first day we met, when our mouths ran away with themselves and we couldn't help but reach for each other. That was dizzying, breathtaking, irresistible.

The day after, though. I woke up next to you and it all fell down around my ears. I'd been hurt before, so many times, seen other people get hurt. I thought I could feel a happy ending with you, I could imagine it so clearly, but then I would open my eyes and remember all the ways it could go sour, and I would run away.

Listen, falling in love is fucking terrifying. There’s no certainty, no assurances that the happy ending will ever come to be, and every chance that everything will shatter if you just bump it at the wrong angle. It's just so _ fragile._

I said that to you, or something like it. You smiled and touched my face and said no, of course it's not certain. We can't know that this will last, but we know it exists right now, and isn't that enough? Isn't it enough to enjoy what we have, rather than panicking about forever and destiny and all those words too big for human tongues?

And I wanted so badly to believe you. I tried so hard to believe you.

  


xii.

It wasn't your fault that you stopped visiting. Assignments change, decisions out of your control.

I cried so hard when you called to tell me. I couldn't breathe at the idea that you wouldn't be coming through town anymore.

It took me a long time to decide to leave.

It wasn't an easy decision. My town was far from idyllic, yes, but it was still mine. My home. Everything I knew and loved. Everything I was.

Except you, of course.

I don't like goodbyes. I packed my bags in the middle of the night and left a note. I had some cash and your address written on a slip of paper and folded up in my pocket. I didn't look back when I left, just rolled my windows down and listened to the crunch and squeak of tires on wet snow.

  


xiii.

There were times with you, late at night, when I would lie awake long past midnight, listening to you breathe next to me. Apart from time, missing the way your eyes would light me up, your voice wind its way into me. And I would know that it couldn't last, that we had rushed too much, put too much of ourselves into each other. Jumped in the middle of the ocean without being sure we knew how to swim.

Am I mixing metaphors here? Sorry about that.

When you were awake, when we were together, everything seemed so clear. Whenever I was alone, or when the house was dark and you were asleep and my mind would take to wandering, I would understand a little better. Realize that we didn't actually know where the hell we were going.

Then I would look over at you, so peaceful in the yellow light glowing through the blinds, and I would love you more than I knew how to contain. And I'd fall asleep pressed against you, and wake to a kiss, and then I would believe in us again.

Was it all worth it, do you think? All those sweet moments. Were they worth the pain we caused each other?

For whatever it's worth, I'm sorry.


End file.
